Laos Motorcycle Diaries
A travelogue.
My nights in Vang Vieng are very different from my days.
I’m staying at a party hostel, Nana’s, which serves free vodka from 8 pm til 10 pm. We spend every night playing cards and then go one of the town’s two bars, which plays k-pop til the end of the night, and lives by the motto: “drink triple, see double, act single.” My first night there a girl jumps on me, puts her tongue down my throat, her hand up my skirt and then passes out. A couple of friends help me carry her to bed where she pees on us. Nice intro.
During the day, meanwhile, I rent a moped, a piece of shit scooter that breaks down every few hundred metres. It barely turns on and has a very sticky clutch so you really have to yank at the accelerator to get it moving, and when it does it lurches forward, going from 0 to 60 kmh. I love riding scooters by now, it is a feeling of such utter freedom. I’d never had a vehicle before so the ability to go where I want and when blows my mind.
There are a few places I want to see, dotted on the other side of town. I first have to cross over the bridge that looks like it is made of Jenga pieces, the entry to which is flanked elegantly with two pillars — oh no wait, those are shell cases. Well, make do with what you have, I guess.
